


The Sweetest of Dreams

by ZetaAdele



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Childhood, Dreamscapes, F/M, Father-Son Relationship, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Ghosts, Mother-Son Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-22
Updated: 2019-02-22
Packaged: 2019-11-03 16:47:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,475
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17881508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ZetaAdele/pseuds/ZetaAdele
Summary: Aulea has visited her son in his dreams every night since her death and she thinks about time that her husband knows about it too.





	The Sweetest of Dreams

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tierciel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tierciel/gifts).



> This was supposed to be just a little AU headcanon idea on the FFXV Discord chat but I just....wrote this much...wish I could write my thesis this effectively. This is dedicated to Yuan who is a sweetheart angel of the fandom! :)
> 
> I lost my mom when I was a baby myself so this kind of me just indulging the wish I had as a little girl that my mom would one day come play with me in my dreams. 
> 
> Also please know that Noctis here is based on this sweet, but also very opinionated, 5-year-old that I've babysat since she was a little baby!

Aulea begins reaching out to her baby in his dreams soon after she dies. If she cannot be there in person to love her son, then she will make a world in his dreams where she can hold him in her arms every night. As a result, Noctis has known his mom for as long as he can remember. He does not know a life without his mother, because when he falls asleep she is there to hold him tight and tell him how much bigger he grows each time she sees him. In his young mind, Noctis only knows he can see his daddy when he’s awake and his mommy when he’s asleep. He doesn’t realize that this is unique to him until he’s much older. 

Regis is the first person to notice that Noctis doesn’t dream like a normal boy. He never has nightmares like other children and he never complains about having to go to bed. It’s the opposite. Noctis loves playing with his father when he’s awake and loves the stories he’s told when he’s tucked gently into bed. But Noctis is always excited to fall sleep, always. It’s only a few months after his son’s fifth birthday that Regis starts to suspect that his late wife is the cause of their little boy’s love of sleep

In their little dreamscape, which shifts according to the game they play but most often takes the form of the nursery Aulea never got to build her son, Aulea loves to tell her boy about stories of when she was young. She met Regis when they were children and they got into all sorts of shenanigans. 

One night she tells Noctis about how they would drop small wooden airplanes from the balcony of an unused ceremonial conference room to see which one flew the furthest. Noctis, a precocious 5-year-old, thinks that this sounds like the best game ever. So Aulea tells him that her little plane should still be in her rooms, she saved some of her old toys to go into the nursery but she didn’t tell Regis so she’s not sure that Noctis ever got them. She tells him to go into her rooms and look in the bottom drawer of one of her dressers to get the airplane. Knowing her son is bound to be as curious as she was at his age she also gives him permission play with anything he finds in her room.  


Aulea’s rooms remain exactly the same as they were when she died. Maids come by to dust it and keep it clean but only Regis enters them on occasion when he misses his wife and the smell of her perfume. There’s no rule keeping people away but there’s an unspoken avoidance and Noctis has never been in his mother’s rooms until she tells him about it.

The morning after his mother tells him about the treasures in her old rooms Noctis slips away from his nanny and scurries over to his mother’s quarters. Using all his strength to push open the large oak door he gasps as he takes in where his mother used to spend much of her time. Her plush bed, her delicately painted armoire, her neatly organized vanity, her bookshelves and drawers; all of it has been left just as she left it. He’s so excited by all that he can explore that Noctis forgets about his mission for his mother’s toy airplane. He digs through all the drawers and his mother’s armoire. Noctis grabs a large midnight blue silk scarf to wear as a little cape and looks through all the beautiful jewelry kept safe atop Aulea’s vanity. He ends up wearing a sapphire necklace that’s just a bit too long for his little body and some matching sapphire bracelets that dangle loosely on his small arms and runs around her room in his ensemble stopping only to admire himself in her gilded mirror.

It is only after his big round of dress up that he remembers his mommy told him that she wanted him to play with the airplane, so he goes searching through the drawer and finds not one but two wooden airplanes. They’re simple but sturdy toy planes made from balsa wood with little designs painted on them in the haphazard style of young children. 

After all this fun and excitement, Noctis has by this time completely forgotten that his nanny must be worried and looking for him. He doesn’t know that she wouldn’t think to check Aulea’s room and has started to alert guards about the prince’s disappearance. He’s completely focused on the new toys in his possession and with the two airplane held in his little chubby hands, Noct decides he wants to see how far they’ll fly. He leaves his mom room, still wearing his cape and necklace, and heads over to the conference room in the oldest, and dustiest, section of the Citadel. Upon finding this new playplace, Noctis spends a good part of the afternoon running up and down a short flight of steps tossing down the planes and watching them fly around the room.

And by this point the citadel staff is now fully in a panic looking for their missing little prince. After over an hour of searching for the little boy that holds a special place in the hearts of the being caretakers and guards looking for him, it’s time to alert the king.

Regis is in his office reviewing a draft of a bill for an expedited visa process for incoming refugees when Cor knocks on his door to let him know that Noctis has gone missing. Sirens go off in Regis’ mind and his first instinct is to panic and start making orders for the Kingsglaive to scour the city because the prince must have been kidnapped. Thankfully, Clarus can see the storm brewing in his old friend and stops him mid-panic with a hand on his shoulder. Clarus, who has had a few more years of parental experience, tells Regis that Noctis has likely just slipped off to play and that they should do further sweeps of the Citadel before sending out a princely Amber Alert. Regis reluctantly agrees with his Shield but will only be able to maintain his wits if he gets to join in on the search. Regis alongside Clarus and Cor begin laying out a plan of attack when a member of the crownsguard notices that door to Aulea’s rooms have been left wide open with her belongings have been strewn about. Regis is informed of this over Clarus’ headset and thinks that one of the older nannies who knew Aulea must have told Noctis a bit about his mother. So, Regis suggests that they start looking for Noctis in places that Aulea liked to play in when she was young. After a few somewhat heartwrenching visit to the places Aulea and Regis used to haunt, Regis and Clarus find themselves outside the old conference room where they can hear a certain little prince giggling. With a sigh of relief Clarus begins the process of calling for an “All Clear” and leaves Regis to go retrieve his naughty little boy by himself. 

To his surprise, Regis finds his son playing with his and Aulea’s old toy planes and is hit with a wave of sadness as he remembers how much he misses his wife. 

Noctis meanwhile has just tossed down the planes for another go when he spots his father and waves “Daddy! Daddy look at the planes!”

Regis gives him a watery smile as he watches Aulea’s plane fly much farther than his old plane (just like it always did). As the planes slowly drift to the floor Noct jumps down the stairs two at a time and runs into his father’s arms for a hug. Regis pulls him in tight, “hello my little star, you gave me a big scare. You can’t run off without telling anyone.”

Noct pouts and shuffles his feet “I’m sorry daddy, I just wanted to play with mommy’s planes! She told me you used to play with them too!”

It takes Regis a moment to digest what Noctis actually told him, “She....told you? Who told you?”

Noctis giggles, “mommy told me daddy, don’t be silly!”

Regis isn’t sure what to say to this. Is Noctis playing a game of imagination? Has a nanny been telling him things and pretending they’re messages from his dead mother? Does he need to fire somebody? Regis decides to learn more before scaring or firing any innocent caretakers. And a gentle approach is best with his sensitive little one “when did ‘mommy’ tell you this, sweetie?”

Noctis looks at his dad with scrunched eyebrows, looking at him like he’s being purposefully dumb “she told me last night! Duh!”

“Last night?” Regis is too confused to question his son further, and in his silence he notices for the first time that his son is wearing his wife’s favourite dark blue scarf as a cape. He gave it to her as a birthday gift years ago. And he’s put on her sapphire necklace which hangs too low for Noctis’ little frame and he cannot help but notice they match his eyes (his mother’s eyes). He smiles to himself, he can’t begrudge his little boy’s attempts to connect with a mother he lost when he was too young to truly know or remember her. His son must have heard stories from nannies who knew Aulea when she was young and gone into her room to play. Regis feels a pang of regret that he wasn’t the one to tell his son those stories, that his duties as king rob him of his role as a father. He ignores the nagging thought at the back of his mind that tells him the nannies would have no knowledge of where Aulea kept her planes or even that she still had them and instead focuses on giving Noctis an indulgent smile “that’s very sweet, my star. I’m sure your mother would be happy to know you’re having as much fun as she–as we–did as children.”

Noctis scrunches his nose in annoyance, sensing that his father has adopted the same tone that many adults have of “that’s cute but I don’t believe him.” But, Noctis decides he won’t push back (he doesn’t want to get in more trouble than having to eat veggies as punishment for running off) and instead plans to tattle on his dad to mom when he sees her that night. Regis takes his back into the care of his nannies who give him a lecture on “not scaring people” and make him eat a huge bow of broccoli as punishment (really it’s a tiny bowl but to Noctis it’s ginormous) and he heads to bed without fuss, planning on telling his mom about his day.

That night in his little dreamscape with his mother, which tonight is the playroom Aulea planned to make for her son, Noctis tells his mother about his adventures. She laughs at his expressive storytelling and all the “treasures” he found in her room. He shows her his “cape” and “pretty necklace” as she claps at his outfit and makes him do a little spin for her. Seeing that her son has inherited her penchant for childhood dress-up she tells him where to find all her most sparkly eyeshadows are and where to find her favourite tiaras and skirts so he can continue to play to his heart’s content. When he tells her about the trouble he got into for running off though, she gives him a look and tells him not to run off again without telling his nanny. He can go play in her room whenever he wants, he has her permission, but he has to tell his nanny first. Noctis huffs but agrees, he doesn’t want to disappoint his mom.

Noct feels like this is a good segue into telling his mom about the planes and how “Daddy didn’t believe me when I said you told me it was okay to play with them!” And suddenly, Aulea realizes that she never thought that Regis would ever be able to find out about, or believe in, her nightly visits to their sweet boy. She never planned on asking Noctis to be a go-between for her and her husband, she visits her son in his dreams because she used every ounce of magic she had left to make sure her baby wouldn’t be left without his mother even if he only knows her spirit. But, now that she knows her son might be able to speak to her husband on her behalf she at the very least wants Regis to know that she is okay and that she misses, and is waiting for, him.

So Aulea comes up with a plan. She stage whispers and asks Noctis if he wants to “hear a secret story about when daddy was little” she gets an enthusiastic nod from her little one. So she tells Noctis about how At the age of 7 Regis once tried to sneak a really fat into the Citadel so he could show it to her (and impress her) but it ended up being a pregnant mother cat (who was very happy to be inside a soft and warm building) that proceeded to give birth on Regis’ bed while he was sleeping. He woke up to see all the little kittens at the foot of his bed and began crying loudly until his nanny came in. Regis told his nanny that he was sad because he must’ve found a broken cat that kept making more cats and that he couldn’t show the cat to Aulea now or else she would make fun of him! His nannies never let him live it down. And neither did Aulea, whose parents ended up letting her adopt two of the kittens. 

Noctis finds this story hilarious because how could his daddy not know about mommy kittens? His daddy knows everything! So Noct decides he must to ask his daddy about this story tomorrow, and he tells his mother just that. Aulea only smiles, her plan worked perfectly. 

Over dinner the next day, in between Noctis attempting to avoid eating the icky veggie soup he’s been served, he asks his dad if the story about the mama kitten is true. Regis blushes, and tells him yes to his young son’s immense entertainment.

“Daddy how did you not know that kitties can be mommies too? I thought you knew everything!”

“I’m sorry to disappoint you my love but I do not know everything. It seems that you’re just a much smarter boy than I was at your age!” Regis pinches his son’s nose playfully, “now who told you that story? I did my best to keep that a secret!”

Noct giggles, “mommy told me! She said she even got to keep two of the kitties!!! A little brown with black spots called Sticte and another one named Issa that she said had green eyes!!! Did you get to play with the kitties too? Did you keep any? What did you name them? Can I get a kitty daddy, please? Mommy got a kitty when she was little too!”

Regis is taken aback by the revelation that Noctis again learned more about his mom, but he’s distracted his young son’s sudden desperate pleas for a kitten of his own. “Your mother didn’t get a kitten until she was 7 and you young man are only 5 so you have to wait at least 2 more years,” he holds up two fingers “until you can get a kitten on your own”

“But my nannies can help me! And I’ll take really really good care of it!”

Regis sighs and spends the rest of their dinner together convincing his son that he can have a kitten just not yet. And their discussion of Aulea and the stories Noctis keeps hearing is forgotten amidst the more pressing conversation of a kitten in the castle.

That night when Aulea sees her son she, to Noctis’ great disappointment, agrees with Regis that Noctis should wait to get a kitten. While he pouts she asks him what his father said about hearing from her. Noctis tells her that he’s not sure, he must’ve forgot. And so Aulea sighs and begins the cycle again.  
This goes on for a full week. Noctis hears about stories of his father doing different embarrassing things from wetting himself after getting hit with a dodgeball, to being forced to perform the Lucian national anthem in front of all his classmates. Each time when Regis asks where Noct heard the story he responds by saying that his “mommy” told him.

As the week comes to close Regis suspects that something supernatural is at play. But he can’t quite to believe his dead wife is the one who is really talking to their boy. So, he asks around, he brings every nanny who could possible know about his childhood misadventures into his office for questioning and when they don’t know he begins asking all of Noct’s teachers and caregivers. But they each and every one of them swears on their lives that they haven’t told the young prince anything about Regis as a child.

Regis is stumped. Could it really be that his wife is speaking to his son? Noctis keeps telling him that his mother talks to him “at night” what does that mean? Is it some sort of cruel trick the Astrals are playing? He decides that the only person he can ask is his son.

The next night he asks Noctis to come to his room and pulls his boy onto his lap as he sits in his favourite chair. Noctis gets comfy, enjoying the rare treat of getting his dad all to himself, and snuggles into his dad’s chest for a hug. Regis rests his hand on his sons head, running his fingers through his baby’s soft downy hair. “So you’ve been talking to your mommy at nighttime, right?”

“Mhm!” Noctis nods against his dad’s hand “when I go to sleep I get to play with mommy! She gives the best hugs! Even better than yours daddy!” 

Regis’ hand stills. “How long have you been playing with mommy for?”

Noctis giggles “since forever daddy! I get to see you when you’re not doing king stuff in the day but I get to see mommy at night time every night! I wish I could see mommy in the daytime like Iggy gets to see his mommy so then I wouldn’t be lonely when you’re busy....but mommy says that since I’m a special boy I only get to see her when I go to sleep!” 

Regis wants to deny this, to say it’s a trick, that the gods are playing a game with him and his son once again. But something deep down tells him that this is too kind. The gods took Aulea away, they wouldn’t give her back to their son for even a moment. 

Regis takes a shuddering breath, “so it’s really your mommy who tells you the stories about us?”

Noct rolls his eyes and whines “of course daddy that’s what I’ve been telling you! Mommy talks about you all the time!”

“She does? W-what...what does she say?” 

Noctis leans back into his dad’s chest, “she tells me all these silly stories! And also, icky stories about how you were all lovey-dovey!” He hums and puts his little fist under his chin “she also says that she loves you! And that she really misses you! I miss you too, when you’re busy with work! I told her that you should come visit both of us when you’re not doing king stuff, but she says that you can only come see her when one day you visit me in my sleep too! But I still think you should say hi to mommy because I know you love her too and she would be happy to hear you say hi like I am happy when you say hi!” 

Noct focuses on the warmth of his dad’s embrace and yawns as he gets sleepy. But his dad hasn’t said anything back yet. 

“Daddy?” Noctis looks up at his dad and sees that his cheeks are wet. Noctis puts his hand on his father’s face gently, “Daddy why are you crying? Did I make you sad?”

Regis just shakes his head and pulls his son back into a hug, “you could never make me sad, you’re my brightest little star.” Noctis nods and yawns again. “Go to sleep love and....and tell your mom I say ‘hi’” 

Noctis falls asleep safe in father’s arms and does just as he’s asked.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for sticking through this!
> 
> Also yes Aulea's kittens had latin names that were common for Roman dogs....what else could we expect from a family that names their son Noctis Lucis Caelum?


End file.
